The Gay Capal of the Neteenth Century | The New Yorker

Contents:

• STANFORD SCHOLAR EXPLOR THE HISTORY OF GAY RIGHTS GERMANY
• QUEER & GAY BERL: YOUR GUI FOR LGBTQ+ BERL
• GAY LIFE BERL IS STARTG TO ECHO A DARKER ERA
• GAY MEN UNR THE NAZI REGIME
• BERL & GAY LIBERATN LONG BEFORE STONEWALL
• A BRIEF HISTORY OF LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, AND TRANSGENR SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

STANFORD SCHOLAR EXPLOR THE HISTORY OF GAY RIGHTS GERMANY

The tle of the chapter, “The German Inventn of Homosexualy, ” telegraphs a prcipal argument of the book: although same-sex love is as old as love self, the public disurse around , and the polil movement to w rights for , arose Germany the late neteenth and early twentieth centuri.

QUEER & GAY BERL: YOUR GUI FOR LGBTQ+ BERL

Beachy, a historian who teach at Yonsei Universy, Seoul, ends his book by notg that Germans hold gay-pri celebratns each June on what is known as Christopher Street Day, honor of the street where the Stonewall prott unfold.

GAY LIFE BERL IS STARTG TO ECHO A DARKER ERA

By the begng of the twentieth century, a non of gay lerature had emerged (one early advote ed the phrase “Stayg silent is ath, ” nearly a century before aids activists ed the slogan “Silence = Death”); activists were bemoang negative pictns of homosexualy (Thomas Mann’s “Death Venice” was one target); there were bat over the ethics of outg; and a schism opened between an clive, mastream factn and a more rto, anarchistic wg. The episo suggts the gree to which the German cultural and tellectual tradn, particularly the Romantic age, which stretched om Goethe and Schiller to Schopenher and Wagner, embolned those who me to intify themselv as gay and lbian.

GAY MEN UNR THE NAZI REGIME

”) Schopenher proceed to expound the dub theory that nature promoted homosexualy olr men as a way of disuragg them om ntug to surprisgly, Karl Herich Ulrichs seized on Schopenher’s cur piece of advocy when he began his mpaign; he quoted the philosopher one of his g-out letters to his relativ. Magn Hirschfeld, his 1914 book “The Homosexualy of Men and Women, ” noted that the Wagner ftival Bayrth had bee a “favore meetg place” for homosexuals, and quoted a classified ad, om 1894, which a young man had sought a handsome pann for a Tyrolean bicyclg expedn; was signed “Numa 77, general livery, Bayrth.

BERL & GAY LIBERATN LONG BEFORE STONEWALL

His tert effemacy among homosexual men, his attentn to lbianism, and his fascatn wh cross-drsg among both gay and straight populatns (he ed the word “transvtism”) offend men who believed that their lt for fellow-mal, pecially for younger on, ma them more virile than the rt of the populatn.

” There is no mentn, for example, of the theatre and mic cric Theo Anna Sprüngli, who, 1904, spoke to the Scientific-Humanarian Commtee on the subject of “Homosexualy and the Women’s Movement, ” helpg to gurate a parallel movement of lbian activism. Disdaful reprentatns of gay life were not only lamented but also protted; Beachy pots out that when a 1927 Komische Oper revue lled “Strictly Forbidn” mocked gay men as effemate, a monstratn at the theatre prompted the Komische Oper to remove the offendg sk. The openns of Berl’s gay scene attracted visors om more benighted lands; Christopher Isherwood lived the cy om 1929 to 1933, enjoyg the easy availabily of htlers, who, Beachy’s book, have a somewhat exhstg chapter to the gay muny, the masculist-sexologil spl persisted.

Some of Brand’s associat were flirtg wh Nazism, and not jt a metaphoril sense; one of them later beme the lover of Ernst Röhm, the head of the Brown the First World War, a new figure entered the ay: Friedrich Radszuwe, an entreprenr who tablished a work of gay publitns, cludg the first lbian magaze, Die Frnd. More specifilly, 's about gay Berl, the gay subculture that flourished Berl the era between World War I and the rise of the Nazis, when there were nightclubs and barets that tered to a gay clientele, gay-themed theater and films and gay-oriented publitns that were sold at ksks.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF LBIAN, GAY, BISEXUAL, AND TRANSGENR SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

Gay prostutn flourished too, so did black male.This relatively open gay culture attracted English wrers and artists, cludg Christopher Isherwood, whose stori were adapted to the mil "Cabaret." My gut Robert Beachy is the thor of the new book "Gay Berl" that scrib that this culture, why flourished, how ntributed to our unrstandg of gay inty and how was eradited by the Nazis.

They advertised all sorts of events, different kds of venu and they also attracted advertisers who were really appealg to a gay and lbian nstuency, and that's also really startlg, I thk.GROSS: We asked you to suggt a performer, a sger, that we uld listen to to give some sense of the mic people were listeng to then at perhaps some of the gay clubs. So and that was, I thk, very much a part of her inty.GROSS: OK, so this is Claire Waldoff, a baret sger and a lbian performer, rerd Germany 1932.(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)CLAIRE WALDOFF: (Sgg German).GROSS: That was Claire Waldoff, a song picked for by Robert Beachy, the thor of the new book "Gay Berl," which is about the gay subculture Berl the 1920s and early '30s, jt before the Nazi rise to power.What was the law regardg homosexualy the '20s and early '30s Berl?BEACHY: The law was origally opprsn, anti-sodomy statute, and crimalized certa sexual acts between men and btialy.